I've been told to give the travelogue thing a shot.
However, I just read JEP's account of gastronomic adventures in the Phillipines, and I'm afraid that nothing that happened to me last week is even remotely as funny and riveting as what he has to say (I don't have the link right here and wouldn't no how to attach it properly even if I had, but I strongly recommend that you check it out. It's in JEP's comment to my last post).

So, I think I'll just give you a quick run-through and then you, the sovereign public of this insignificant mumbling, can pick and choose what you want me to write about (and if I have to take a bit of creative license to properly respond to your requests, so be it. As the worthy sorta-Founding Father of my little South American country famously said: "My Authority Stems From You And Ceases Before Your Sovereign Presence" Quite the mouthful).

Without further ado, then, we have the categories:

• the weather (it rained) [I'm definitely putting my money on this one getting the most votes; it has such an outlandish, exotic aura surrounding it!]
• the food (kind of sucked, survived on Garotos -- which for the uninitiated might sound a bit weird since 'garoto' is portuguese for boy, but there's a simple explanation that I won't be revealing just yet, otherwise there's no point in this whole caboodle -- if that's the appropriate noun to describe this)
• the fact that we (my group) were five girls while the other teams put together made a round 20 guys from various corners of Latin America (and therefore we were the queens of the hive) [NOTE: this topic will probably include upon development several sundry reflections of a feminist nature. You have been warned]
• the paraguayan pseudo-war cry
• reflections upon the fact that I more or less pulled a dastardly betrayal on a friend and then proceeded to muddle it even further up with my usual cowardice and plain stupidity [though maybe I should save this for a future MySpace account, if I ever come to that]
• babbling on how abso-friggo-lutely AWESOME and OUT OF THIS WORLD the whole experience was, bla bla bla, and earnest statements regarding the crucial relevance of events such as these to foster integration and a sense of community to the youth of this continent, we are all connected, never will forget this, strive to make the world a better place, bla bla and BLA

Well, I'm sure I missed something along the way -- after all it was one long sleep-deprived canter of a week -- so for your convenience I am also inaugurating a free-for-all question extravaganza so that you can help me fill in the gaps.

Aren't I generous?? I know you love me... No autographs, please, and NO pushing